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Posts tagged ‘Six Pack’

How Ripped Can You Get In 40 Days?

I have not written for a while. This is for a couple reasons, first life has been busy but more importantly second, I have been hitting the gym hard for the MI40 Transformation Contest. Here are the pics, I will add my comments after.

MI40 Transformation Challenge Results Front

MI40 Transformation Challenge Results Front

Side

Back

This was a huge transformation, that I really can’t believe. I didn’t think I was that bad to start with and it was going to be tough. I don’t think I will win, there are probably some pretty high level bodybuilders that follow Ben’s program. There were a couple things that prevented me from doing better.

First was a 10 day vacation at Disney world with my family. Our hotel had an awesome gym but I only got 2 workouts in. And trying to eat good when eating out every meal for 10 days is tough. That on top of a couple nights of deserts.

Second thing was as much as I made this a priority, I still have a family and job and other things in life that are a much higher priority. My sleep was good most of the time but could have been better. My diet was almost perfect when we were home, mostly thanks to my awesome wife.

Last thing was the 2 gyms that I go to, neither of them have all the equipment that Ben puts in his program. Most notably is a hack squat machine. I usually replaced them with some sort of front squat usually in a smith machine, but you can’t over load the legs the same way.

My weight only went down about 2-3 pounds, which is good. I will be adding in some more carbs the next while to add some more mass.

One thing to note is I did this all without counting any calories or macronutrient ratios. I did keep carbs really low at certain times but never counted. I followed my normal paleo with leangains style intermittent fasting. If you want my specific eating routine and workout schedule sign up to my email list I will be sending it out sometime soon.

As for the blog, I am going to keep writing, hopefully writing some more. I am not going to be as detail and do as much research, it will probably be more opinion based stuff, or maybe just some copy/paste of posts I make on reddit and 4hbtalk.com. If there is anything specific you want me to write about let me know in the comments.

Cutting it short at day 35

You are probably wondering why I am not doing the full. First off I had great results with this program. I think I am at my biggest and leanest that I have ever been. I will be getting a BF% test done soon to find out specifics. So if it is a good program and I had success then why stop with only 5 days left????? Well Ben just started a contestwith some pretty cool prizes.

Before Pic On Day 3 of MI40

After pic MI40 May 3rd 2012

I am pretty happy with the results so far. I will be updating my routine shortly to show all of the meals and supplements I have been doing.

Because the contest starts in a few days I am going to rest up, sleep and eat as much as I can and start the program all over again on the 7th.

Check out the prizes
Anyone wants to join me let me know via email or in the comments.

The author Mike Geary is just personal trainer, but he does have many years of real experience helping people. I was hoping for a really simple easy to follow program that laid everything out for you, but after reading the whole book it is much more than that.

The book reads like a really long blog post, it is pretty informal. I am not sure if I like or dislike that but it is pretty easy to read. It would be tough to read the whole thing at once it is 152 pages long. It is broken down into sections, so that is how I will review it, but there is no table of contents which is kinda odd to me.

Preface

In the preface he tries to answer some common questions and get them taken care of right away. He states his methods are unconventional (similar to Tim and the 4HB), but to trust him that they work which he proves by using the thousands of people that he has helped. He also emphasizes the book is meant to be read start to finish, unlike the “Choose your own adventure” that The 4HB is. For any women reading it he acknowledges there is little difference between the program for men vs women. The program is made for people with or without a gym. There are some ads for adjustable dumbbells and stability balls for people that want to workout at home and do more than just bodyweight exercises.

1.0 The Intro

Not much covered here, just some basic stats and some other generic info.

2.0 RELATIVE LEANNESS OR BODY FAT %

He discuss that ab exercises won’t get you a six pack unless you have a low body fat percentage. No news here for us that read The 4HB.

3.0 THE STARTING POINT

Here he gets into some motivation. This is probably the most overlooked part of any diet and fitness book. You could make the assumption that because people already bought the book they are some what motivated. But staying motivated, that is that hard part. I think he has done a good job here, but it is hard to rival the motivation that Tim provides in the 4HB and The 4HWW.

4.0 DIET

Here he continues to discuss how much more important diet is than exercise. We already know that to be the case. One thing that is missing is how important sleep is, he hides that at the end under “Additional Tips”

4.1 Carbs, and GI of Foods

This section is an obvious overlap with the Slow Carb diet from the 4HB. He does a really good job of explaining the good and bad of insulin, carbs et al. I really like how he emphasizes how bad grains are, and he even mentions “Paleo”.

4.2 Fad Diets

I really like this section and how he emphasizes food quality and not macronutrient break down. That being said, some people may have faster results if they keep their carbs down initially, but we know long term that food quality is much more important.

4.3 Fats

Another good section full of things that took me a many months of books, websites and podcasts to learn. The importance of dietary fat, and what is good and bad fat. He includes some links to US Wellness Meats, which I have not yet purchase from but will soon. There are some discussion of omega-3 and omega-6 ratio. He seems to prefer krill oil, but I still like the more natural fermented cod liver oil.

4.4 Balanced Healthy Eating

Just more discussion on eating REAL food.

4.5 Infrequent Overfeeding

This is an interesting way of describing a cheat day or a refeed. He discuss leptin and starvation mode. Not sure on his science here but a re-feed is an important concept. I always suggest keeping cheat days gluten free.

Some interesting discussion on high fructose corn syrup and trans fat. Nothing new really but still very important information.

4.8 Calcium

This is an investing topic that is new to me. I have not read much on the relationship between calcium and body fat. I am not sure if this is just a correlation thing or if there is any biochemistry that supports this. I do like that he emphasizes raw milk and its benefits, unfortunately I live in Canada where it is outlawed. I do wish that he emphasized other sources of calcium more instead of just a small note at the end. He also misses some important things like absorption and vitamin D, as well as acid base balance and how it affects calcium.

4.9 Tea

No secret here for us 4HB folk and those of use that have had great success with PAGG.

4.10 Another Metabolism Boosting Food

This one was new to me, and I am going to purposely leave this out of my review, don’t want to give all his secrets away.

4.11 Estrogenic Compound

Our good friend soy. And to think that I used to believe the BS that soy was good for you. Another great chapter that reveals some seriously wrong myths in today’s health food industry.

4.12 Summary

This is a good summary of what to do if you want to skip all the why, but I recommend agains that.

4.13 Healthy Balanced Meal Plan Ideas/Examples

Here is a pretty big list of meal ideas with full macronutrient breakdowns. Really useful and makes it really easy.

5.0 ABDOMINAL DEVELOPMENT

I am not going to discuss each section of this topic, as I agree with Mike that exercises, especially ab exercises, are pretty useless. He starts with some anatomy which is good. Then describes the optimal position to be in, some over lap here with The 4HB six minute ab chapter. Then he recommends some exercises and has some pictures of him doing them, with detail explanations of how to perform them. Next he lays out a full program at different difficulty levels.

6.0 – 11 Exercise

Again I am grouping a bunch of sections together, because we know that exercise is not as important. Mike begins by discussing Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR), which is better know to us as Basal Metabolic Rate. More lean mass the higher your RMR. He discusses the differences between isolation exercises and multi-joint movements. One thing that he does mention, but does not discuss is testosterone and the endocrinology involved in full body exercises. He has a good discussion on rest and training frequency. Although he suggests 45-60 minute workouts which use 4HB people know is not necessary. There is a long discussion on cardio and HIIT, and I am a big fan of HIIT.

12.0 ADDITIONAL TIPS

These tips are all very good, so good that I would have give them more emphasis. I have discussed previously how big of an impact cortisol can have on fat loss, and I think for some people this is the single biggest factor.

13.0 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Here he lists the same content from the entire book into a question and answer form.

My Thoughts

From what I have learned getting to single digit body fat, I have no doubts that if you follow Mike’s guide you will be able to have a size pack. I was surprised at the amount of good science that he has in his ebook that contradicts conventional health and fitness (although there are a couple minor things missing and wrong). Although it is not the same type of book as The 4-Hour Body, I think that its format makes it much easier to follow, and is easy to adapt to each fitness level. I do recommend it but I do think the price is pretty steep, unless you choose the $5 trial offer.

If I were to write a book like this I would:

Include references for the “sciencey” stuff

Include more strategies for motivation

Recommend methods for tracking progress

Have a plan for transitioning to lower carbs

Not recommend counting calories

Emphasize sleep and cortisol control

Have a workout program that is only HIIT circuits that are 15-30 minutes

Include some mobility workouts to help with more general fitness

If you have read “The Truth About Six Pack Abs” what did you think? Did you have success following it?

Mike also has a lot of good free info on his blog take a look at some of these articles.

I have not posted a progress update for a while, I have been mostly in maintenance mode until the last couple weeks. After reading Gary Taubes book “Why We Get Fat and What To Do About It” I was motivated to cut my carbs back even more, and I saw immediate results.

One other change that I did make 2 months ago was a new job that had a Gym very close, so I now am able to lift real weights at lunch time 3-4 times a week. Lifting heavy vs bodyweight exercises is a big difference.